Foreplay

Summary:

The MCRT is working to stop a case involving a bomber. After a close call, Abby organizes a team ice skating outing. This takes place a few weeks after last year's Ice Skating story, Hearts Shall Dance.

Notes:

This is the second of the stories that ma chere amie Red_Pink_Dots collaborated with me to work on a combination of story and artwork for this holiday challenge. I will admit that I was very much in a "The Cutting Edge" mood and there will definitely be some references made in this story ;)

Once again, I must thank my beautiful Red_Pink_Dots for jumping in feet first in working with me to create all this artwork and talk through the stories, and read through my drafts. It has been a busy year IRL for you and for me, and we have both had some quiet times creativity wise this year, so I thank you for making time for our friendship, for helping me get the muse excited to write, and for the gift of all these artworks :D You are the best, my Elton <3 *bisous*

The title of this story comes from a piece of dialogue from The Cutting Edge. Tomorrow, there will be a continuation of this story, in the Kissing theme. So hopefully, that's enough foreplay for you :PHale: You're falling for him.Kate: What?Hale: Doug.Kate: [sarcastic] Yeah.Hale: You are. You're falling for him.Kate: Well, that's crazy.Hale: You think so?Kate: You're nuts.Hale: Am I?Kate: Well, you see how we act together.Hale: Yes, I do.Kate: We never get along. I mean, we're always fighting.Hale: Foreplay.

Work Text:

It was a cold and icy day, made even colder by the bomb threats that Tony and the MCRT had been chasing down all week, all of which pointed to one or a single group of suspected serial bombers. So far, two of the threats had been a hoax, but two of them had been real. Luckily for them, both times it wasn’t a hoax, they had found the explosive devices in time to evacuate the area and allow the bomb disposal unit to do their job. It was now their fifth bomb threat at a Naval base or US Navy function, this time at a huge memorial service by the Potomac.

The MCRT were spread out along the river, looking for the device, while the crowd was being evacuated to a hopefully safe distance. They had comms in their ears, informing each other of their progress during the search.

Tony and McGee were the lucky ones to find the device in a small backpack left under a park bench overlooking the river. The backpack was open and the timer counting down was clearly visible. Unluckily for them though, this time they didn’t have the luxury of time to respond.

“Boss, thirty seconds on the timer,” Tony yelled into the comms. “McGee, get out of here! Go go go!!!”

McGee gave Tony a scared look. “Not without you, Tony.”

“Evac! Now!” Tony barked at him. “No time for bomb disposal. Go!”

“McGee, run!” Gibbs’ voice came over the comms, giving McGee the order. “DiNozzo, Pamchenko it into the Potomac then get the fuck out of there.”

McGee took a look at Tony’s determined expression, and heeded Gibbs’ voice still in his ear, urging him to run. He ran off at a dead sprint away from the bench while Tony pulled the backpack up by the straps. It was surprisingly heavy. The timer was counting down faster than Tony would believe. He hefted the bag, spun like he was about to complete a hammer throw, executing a few smooth spins before he let go of the backpack over the railing and it sailed out, a fair distance over the river, where there were no boats or anything in sight.

“Haul ass, Tony!” Gibbs’ voice was urgent in his ear.

“On it,” Tony huffed out and took off to try to put some distance between himself and the bomb, and so he missed it when the backpack hit the water, sank a little, and a powerful explosion churned the water around it throwing jets of water up into the air. The blast concussion wave picked Tony up and flung him into the air and he landed awkwardly, trying to roll through the landing.

“DiNozzo!” Gibbs voice cut through the air and he and McGee were running towards him.

McGee reached him first, given that he had been closer, but Tony was already picking himself up off the ground. He helped Tony up and hugged him tightly. “Fuck, Tony,” he muttered breathlessly. “Are you OK?”

“What?” Tony turned to him, frowning and shaking his head.

“I guess you can’t hear me?” McGee asked, raising his voice.

“I can’t hear you!” Tony yelled.

Gibbs arrived and smacked both of his agents on the back of their heads.

“Ow!” Tony whimpered, bending over and holding the back of his head, in real pain now.

“Boss!” McGee yelled at him angrily. “Stop hitting him! He might have a head injury!”

“What?” Tony turned to McGee again, making Gibbs roll his eyes, although his lips tightened into a straight line, worry reflected in his eyes.

EMTs came running up and led Tony away, sitting him down in the back of the ambulance and doing a check up. Gibbs went with them, keeping his worried eyes on Tony until the man looked up and gave him a nod, meeting his eyes.

“I’m OK Boss,” he assured the older man, voice still raised. He was obviously still having trouble with his ears. “I’m fine. Go back and work the scene.”

Gibbs gave him a serious look before he turned to the EMTs. “Check him out and don’t trust him if he says it doesn’t hurt,” he told them. “Don’t let him talk you out of getting treatment if he needs it.” He patted Tony’s shoulder gently, fingers brushing the back of his head in a quick but tender caress.

They nodded and Tony found himself being herded into the ambulance, regardless of his objections.

A couple hours later, Gibbs had released the scene on land but divers were still working with bomb disposal to recover as much of the pieces of the device as they could. Abby swung by the hospital to pick him up and she took him back to the site after having a short chat with the nurses. Abby chattered to Tony about what she needed to do to when she was looking through the remains of these devices to try and find clues to identify the bomb maker. So far the devices they had found pointed to possibly a single bomb builder, so she wanted to look at these pieces to see if this would help her identify the bomber.

“No concussion,” Abby reported to Gibbs when she delivered Tony back to the team lead. “No lacerations. Bruises all over though. But he’s OK.”

“Is it true that you invoked a movie reference to get Tony to act, Bossman?” Abby jumped up and down excitedly. “Has being around Tony all these years affected you so much?”

“No,” Gibbs denied it, and to Abby’s surprise, Tony’s expression was surprisingly in agreement with Gibbs’. As if Tony hadn’t somehow recognized the reference even though he’d completed the move. Or technically completed only half the move because he didn’t run to catch the bomb after he flung it into the air.

Abby stared at both men in confusion. Firstly, McGee had told her about this, which she couldn’t believe, and then she had corroborated it by listening to the recording of the comms from when they discovered the device.

“I heard it on the comms,” she insisted. “There was mention of the Pamchenko, which is from a total chick flick ice skating movie.”

“I don’t watch movies,” Gibbs told her curtly, and he moved away, barking orders to Tony and his team.

Abby pulled Tony’s hand before he could run off too. “I listened to the recording, Tony. Gibbs used a movie reference to get you to spin and throw the bomb into the river.”

“I don’t think so,” Tony dismissed it. “I have to get back to work before the Boss yells at me. I don’t think my head can take being yelled at too much today, Abs.”

So Abby let Tony join his team while she awaited the final pieces of evidence to be collected from the river, and then they moved the investigation back to the Navy Yard. But even though it had been an eventful day, it had been mid-morning when they found the device so by the time five o’clock rolled around, they had done all they could for the time being. They hadn’t yet identified the bomb maker, but they needed to get some sleep so they would be ready to start fresh the next day.

Gibbs dismissed everyone right on time, and Tony sighed in relief. He was exhausted. His body ached and there was still an annoying ringing in his ears, although his hearing was much better and he’d stopped accidentally yelling at everyone now. It was lucky that the device had detonated underwater or he would be much more injured. But now here was Abby, up in the bullpen, pestering everyone to go out ice skating with her.

Gibbs and Tony exchanged a look, knowing that Abby had not forgotten the whole ‘Pamchenko’ thing. Engineering an ice skating outing was her way of bringing it up without actually talking about it. McGee immediately agreed to go with faked enthusiasm and everyone could tell that Abby had already strong armed him into going along with this at some earlier point in the day. Ziva agreed, because Abby was hard to say no to. But Tony tried to beg off.

“I just want to go home and nap, Abs,” Tony whined. “I’m tired. I hurt. I was almost blown up today, you know?”

“But who will help Ducky and make sure he doesn’t fall on the ice tonight?” Abby fluttered her eyelashes, giving Tony the sad puppy dog eyes. “Please? For Ducky?”

Tony sighed and closed his eyes. “Fine. Whatever.”

“You’re the best skater of us all, Tony. We saw that in the case with the body on the ice rink at the Naval Academy that we had last month,” Abby continued.

“Fine. I said fine,” Tony grumbled, as they all grabbed their things.

“We’ll see you tomorrow, Bossman!” Abby saluted Gibbs.

“Am I not invited?” Gibbs asked her mildly.

“Of course you’re invited, Gibbs!” Abby grinned, eyes bright with happiness. “I just figured that you would think this was beneath you and you wouldn’t come ice skating with us.”

“You’d be wrong,” he retorted, pulling his jacket on and getting his gun and badge out of his drawer. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

And he didn’t even look like he was already regretting the words.

At the skating rink, they rented skates and Tony took extra time to ensure that Ducky’s were laced on tightly before he escorted the elderly ME onto the ice. Ducky took Tony’s arm and they slowly skated around the rink. Ziva took a few minutes to get used to being on the ice, and wasn’t a terrible skater overall. Abby was fine and she skated around, hanging out with her friends on the ice. For a while, Gibbs allowed Ziva and Abby both to hang on to him as they skated around the rink. Even Tony was smiling as he skated, ensuring that Ducky was safe with him. Being older, any kind of fall would not bode well for the Scotsman, so Tony took extra care with him.

There was a thin ring of people who had stopped to watch a woman figure skate, and Tony and Ducky could see that she was actually not bad. She was executing spins and even a small jump or two, and the audience starting applauding her.

A hand on Tony’s free arm made him turn his head, and he saw Gibbs skating with them. Gibbs leaned close, lips right by Tony’s ear.

“You’re way better than she is,” Gibbs whispered.

Tony couldn’t help but blush at that, and he smiled shyly, embarrassed at the compliment. Gibbs’ hand slipped to the small of his back and Gibbs began a conversation with Ducky, the three men skating together, Gibbs keeping his hand where it was low on Tony’s back, right above the swell of his ass. When Gibbs disengaged, he ended up squeezing Tony’s hand gently before moving away, and Tony’s response was a blush and a shyly flirtatious smile.

Neither man noticed Abby’s sharp eyes following their interactions, especially the almost hand holding and Tony’s blush at the end of it.

They all had dinner together after their ice skating outing. When he got home, Tony drew himself a hot bath and eased his aching body into the hot water, allowing the heat of the water to help soothe and relax his muscles. His eyelids were heavy and he leaned his head back on the towel he’d placed to be his pillow.

Loud knocking on the door startled him out of a fairly sound sleep, causing him to jerk up and splash himself in the face. He’d fallen asleep in the bath. The water was cold by this time. He splashed out of the tub, shivering a little, pulled a towel around his waist and went to check to see who on earth would be knocking on his door so late.

It was Gibbs.

Surprised, he undid his locks and bolts and opened the door. “Another bomb threat?” he asked. “So soon?”

“No,” Gibbs’ answer was distracted. His eyes were hot on Tony’s wet and almost naked body. He swallowed with difficulty, eyes on Tony’s crotch. “Did I wake you?”

“Fell asleep in the bath,” Tony shrugged.

Gibbs rolled his eyes and growled under his breath.

“What’s up?” Tony stepped aside, gesturing Gibbs in.

The team lead walked into the apartment and barely waited for Tony to close his door before pushing the man against it and devouring Tony’s lips. He kissed Tony, sucking on his tongue and nipping at his lips, insinuating a thigh in between Tony’s damp thighs, feeling Tony start to harden against him as he rutted into Gibbs’ body. Gibbs’ fingers were in Tony’s hair. This thing between them was still very new and they hadn’t had a lot of opportunity for a lot of intimacy yet, given their crazy work schedule. Not to say that they hadn’t taken every opportunity for sex that they could, but this development was still quite new for them.

“Almost lost you today,” Gibbs muttered, in between kisses.

“I’m OK,” Tony mumbled into Gibbs’ mouth. “I am.”

“I know,” Gibbs mouthed back. “Don’t you do that to me again.”

“It’s not like I intended to find the bomb with thirty seconds on the timer. We were all out looking for the device.”

“Don’t care,” Gibbs insisted. “Don’t do that again.”

Tony smiled into the kiss. “I’ll try.”

“You better.”

“You’re on record ordering me to do something by referencing a movie though,” Tony teased him.

“Grab your skates. I got the rink for you tonight,” Gibbs gave him an imploring look. “I need to see you skate the way I know you can skate. It was… unsatisfying to see you so restrained and curbed on the ice tonight. You should always be free.”

“Oh,” Tony sighed, kissing him again. “We could maybe just have a quickie before we go?”

“Appointment,” Gibbs tapped his watch.

“A blow job?” Tony tried again, not giving up hope.

“I want to see you skate, then I want to take you to bed and take you apart, piece by piece until you’re begging to come,” Gibbs’ fingers tightened almost painfully in Tony’s hair. “Get dressed. Grab your skates. I’ll reward you later.”

Tony whined when Gibbs pulled away and even though the towel fell and Gibbs’ eyes were lustfully trained on his exposed dick, hard and already starting to leak, he insisted that Tony get dressed. So he did. He pulled on comfortable pants that weren’t too tight or too loose, pants that would give him freedom to move without getting in the way as he skated, a long sleeved athletic undershirt that hugged his torso snugly, and other layers before they left. Gibbs drove in his usual manner so they got to the Naval Academy ice rink quickly.

Tony shed his layers and wasted no time in putting his figure skates on. The ones that Gibbs had gotten him for Christmas. The ones that had started their relationship. Truth be told, it had been unsatisfying for him as well, to be on the ice as restrained as he was earlier in the evening. It had been fun to hang out with his friends, certainly, but he privately agreed with Gibbs that he was a better skater than the woman who had been pulling out her moves earlier, and he was itching to let loose. Gibbs sent him onto the ice with a soft kiss on his lips, and Tony began skating hard, warming up, stretching, doing leg lifts and spins. He put his concentration into his skating, trying out a few dance moves, combining spinning and leg lifts, and built up to jumping. His jumps were improving, since he’d started skating again in the last few weeks, but he did end up on the ice a few times with some of his attempts. He skated until he was tired out, and slowed down, cooling himself down.

Gibbs was smiling so openly and happily as Tony skated back to where he was waiting. What they had was still so new that it still threw Tony every time Gibbs smiled at him, this open, genuine, happy smile. He couldn’t help but smile back. He coaxed Gibbs to lace on skates and get on the ice with him. They skated hand in hand for a while, going around and around the rink while Tony babbled on about everything and nothing and Gibbs grunted a response every now and then. After a little while, Tony began skating backwards, holding both of Gibbs’ hands and helping him along. Gibbs allowed Tony to take the lead, and the younger man began trying a few simple dance moves, and even though Gibbs objected verbally, he went with it, allowing Tony to lead and to show him what to do, and they ended with Tony plastered to Gibbs’ back, guiding both their bodies into a slow spin, using his hands to position Gibbs’ legs the way he needed them to be as they moved into the spin.

Tony knew that his dick was poking Gibbs in the ass at the end of this and he spun himself around to Gibbs’ front, dipped him low, and they kissed right there on the ice. Tony straightened up and helped Gibbs regain his balance after spinning and dipping like that, still kissing him.

“Time to go,” Gibbs pulled away, smiling. “Promised you a reward.”

“Yes, you did,” Tony agreed, huskily, allowing Gibbs to herd him back to the edge of the rink. “Will there be tongue tonight?” he asked naughtily.

Gibbs smirked at him, catching the reference to his definition of kissing from their first skating ‘date’. “You betcha.”

Notes:

Now, if you guys were wondering, what is the Pamchenko? Here is the scene from The Cutting Edge where they perform the move that became known as the Pamchenko. And no, Tony didn't catch the bomb after he threw it so technically, he only executed a half Pamchenko? Also the spin that Tony and Gibbs execute is like the one at about 2:31 of the clip linked. The Pamchenko move starts right after that, up to maybe 2:58 or so.

And unlike most of my stories, I don't actually have a song or songs that I listened to while I wrote this. But I did end up watching this pair figure skating do their program a lot while I wrote this story to help keep me in the ice skating mood: Tatiana Volosovhar/Maxim Trankov skate. I also loved the music that they used for their program.

And of course, the artwork that RPD made is perfect! This was one of those stories that I assumed would not be one that could really be illustrated, but RPD proved me wrong. Go check out RPD's art post for this, and give her all the love! I love all of the elements that she got in the piece! It's fabulous! And to tease you all, tomorrow we will have the next installation of this series of Tony skating, in the Kissing theme instead, complete with spectacular RPD artwork!

Merci beaucoup, ma cherie! This artwork is amazing as always! I can't even thank you for helping work through these holiday theme ideas with me and for the awesome artwork! You are the absolute best, my Elton! <3 <3